An age-old idea courses through a host of 2025's genre movies. It's an idea that stretches back in time to the time of the Little Tramp. In James Gunn’s *Superman*, the villain is a envious, ruthless billionaire wielding his vast wealth to defame Earth's superhero icon while manipulating world events for his own profit. In *Jurassic World: Rebirth*, the antagonist is a privileged biotech mogul squandering vast sums to cast the heroes into a monster-filled death trap for personal amusement. Within the animated sequel *Zootopia 2*, the villains are a dynasty of super-wealthy lynxes who appropriated a well-meaning mother's beneficial creation and framed her for murder, solely for their financial benefit.
A Legacy of Cinematic Class Warfare
In the remake of *The Running Man*, a wealthy media magnate plays a rich antagonist running a TV network that makes millions by exploiting and murdering people living in abject destitution, while leveraging deepfakes and a powerful propaganda machine to label them as avaricious, indolent, terrifying criminals. *Wicked: For Good* doesn't highlight class division in such a blunt manner, but its antagonists live in obvious luxury while preying upon and oppressing Oz's most vulnerable population, forcing them from their homes and into bondage. The Chinese animated hit *Ne Zha 2*, the year's highest-grossing movie, contrasts the scrappy residents of a impoverished farm town against haughty aristocrats who inhabit opulent sky-high mansions above the clouds. Interestingly, the agreeably goofy farcical update *The Naked Gun* centers on a billionaire's plot to cause planetary doom — to make money, naturally.
There is little especially new in a series of movies presupposing that the wealthy have disproportionate control, are devoid of conscience, and a insatiable, privileged desire for increased fortune. "Elites are the bad guys and everyday folks are heroes" as a plot device dates back to the birth of movies, with the Little Tramp's adventures contrasting his perpetually impoverished beloved underdog against fat cats, bosses, and bumbling wealthy fools. Beginning with the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland "Let’s put on a show" films of the 1930s to the 1980s dance movies that revised the exact same bit for the era of the greedy, harmful tech-bro villain, the complete chronicle of cinema is filled with "eat the rich" stories, which assume that wealth is incompatible with fundamental decency, and exalt the overthrowing, downfall, and sometimes elimination of elite figures.
The Catharsis That Alters Little
And yet, for some reason, we never get around to taking down the wealthy. On each occasion politicians respond to a new mass shooting event by faulting violent video games, I roll my eyes, because if people really were that impressionable — if repeated viewing to an idea via media was enough to make it seep the societal mindset — certainly American society would not continue to revere billionaires. But the news makes it obvious every single day that a alarming number of Americans instinctively equate riches with intelligence and importance, even after decades of history's most popular movies promoting a contradictory message.
In fact, it seems like the never-ending cycle of anti-wealth storylines in American cinema has given us a safety outlet that gets in the way of real-world action. Provided with a steady diet of predominantly triumphant tales where the everyman triumphs, while the billionaires are neutralized and shamed, everyone can finish the film content about right prevailing. These movies are like ethical parables, implying that the system works, and that resourceful individuals will weed out any malicious actors among the largely hard-working, virtuous, deserving wealthy who lifted themselves by their bootstraps.
A More Pointed Edge in 2025
Although 2025's movies do not break new ground in that regard, they certainly adhere to some contemporary patterns among class warfare stories: They’re getting more furious, sharper, more direct, and observably more violent. It’s rarely enough nowadays to see rich people be taught a lesson in humility, like in 1941's *Sullivan's Travels*, or lose their money to the people they exploited, like in 1983's *Trading Places*. In 2025, avaricious, malicious rich individuals were slaughtered by legendary creatures (*Death of a Unicorn*) and devoured by a colossal prehistoric creature (*Jurassic World: Rebirth*). They were blown up on a alien world (*Mickey 17*) and shot in the face directly on a broadcast (*The Running Man*). They were stabbed to death with a wine opener (*Companion*) and beaten to death by an up-and-coming rival (*Him*).
"Hardly any of 2025’s ultra-rich villains get the packed into a police car ending, likely due to it’s become so clear that rich people operate under different standards, and are all too likely to purchase their freedom."
The "behind bars" resolution fails to deliver anymore. Rather, these villains are prone to die at the final act of their movies, often in particularly grotesque, ironic ways.
Notable Exceptions
There are exceptions, of course. Superman's arch-nemesis in *Superman* is only disgraced, revealed, and dispatched to prison. Monstrous manipulator Julian Dillinger in *Tron: Ares* finds himself confined to the digital realm, teasing that he is being saved for a follow-up film. Korda in Wes Anderson's *The Phoenician Scheme* forfeits all his money and is reformed as a person. The wealthy lynx dynasty members in *Zootopia 2* are exposed as thieves and liars, but they don’t meet|avoid
